The history of the First World War. Two Banners

The banner is a regimental shrine to protect
to death. It should resemble an oath that
to the last drop of blood
for Faith, King and Fatherland. "

O banner dilapidated, beautiful regiment native,
You, swearing glory crowned in battle,
Whose heart is not ready for your scraps,
All the benefits of forgetting and giving your life.

In "War and Peace," Count Tolstoy has the following phrase:
".... not the victory, which is determined picked up pieces of matter on sticks ...". General Dragomirov didn’t like her: "Count Tolstoy, of course, knows the peculiarity of human nature, by virtue of which every material thing acquires significance not so much in itself as in the concepts that it connects with this thing. From this point of view the most insignificant an object can become a shrine for a person, the preservation of which for him merges with the preservation of his own honor and becomes immeasurably higher than the preservation of his own life. We go further, descend into the category of those things with which man does not connect actually no special significance, and who throws as soon as they have served their time. What feeling will arise in you if a stranger, coming up to you and grasping a cigarette box that you put along at least, will throw it on the floor. This person insults you, meanwhile in essence, he did the most innocent affair, threw the penny thing on the floor. From this it follows that every most insignificant thing, becoming an affiliation of a person, turns as if in part of himself to such an extent that you consider it a rude act regarding it by your personal dignity.

What is true about single personalities is even more true about those large grouped personalities called battalions, regiments. Not representing in appearance one being, they need such symbols, such material signs, which serve as a tactile evidence of the inner spiritual unity of people who make up a certain part. The banner is precisely this symbol. In a decent part, everything can die for military life, one thing remains unchanged and eternal, how eternal are man's creations: the spirit and the banner, its material representative. The unit, which retained the banner in battle, retained its honor inviolable, despite the most difficult, sometimes disastrous provisions; the part that lost the banner is the same as the disgraced and unpayable man. Taking this into consideration, everyone will agree that a piece of matter that connects thousands of people around itself, the preservation of which cost the lives of hundreds, and maybe thousands of people who were part of the regiment during its secular existence, that such a piece of matter is sacred, conditional military shrine, but the shrine in the direct and immediate meaning of the word, and that of all the trophies is the one that most testifies to the moral victory over the enemy. "

"And Always a dangerous case in the retrade comes up, then the flag of the flagpole to tear off must be buried in oneself or be twisted around one another and be saved with it".

Emperor Peter the Great

It is possible that, entering these words in his 1716 regulation, Peter recalled how many of the banners were saved near Narva. Since then, following his covenant, the Russian flags that had got into trouble were saved. So it was in the Seven Years' War, in the campaign of 1799, and near Austerlitz, it was the same in 1914.
Heavy trials fell to the share of the regiments of the army of General Samsonov, who were surrounded by 1914 in August in East Prussia.
To fulfill your duty towards the banner was not easy.

Heavy artillery and machine guns, sweeping from the face of the earth whole companies, in general raised the question of the feasibility of the presence of banners in battle. After all, the banner served as a symbol around which the fighters gathered, and in the new conditions of battle, when they had to dig into the ground and strive to remain invisible, the banner seemed to have no place at all. Some armies, such as the English, did not take banners for campaigns from the 80s of the last century, others, like German and Austro-Hungarian, sent them to the rear from 1915. Only the French and the Russians remained with a different opinion and always kept the banners on the shelves ... Even in the Second World War.

Samsonov's army fell into the encirclement of the encirclement. We have already had occasion to briefly write about the fate of its banners on the pages of this magazine. Here we may examine in detail two cases, appealing to readers with the request to complete the data given by us. Both testify to the heroic, sacrificial spirit that animated officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers of the Imperial Army, from whom we will not separate representatives of the military clergy.

What feelings the Russian officers had for their banners and standards, clearly emerges from the following two extracts from the memoirs of Colonel Ouspensky, 106, Infantry. Ufa regiment, and the General Count Niroda, commander l. Guards Dragoon Regiment:

"My heart was sad. Despite the terrible fatigue, I couldn’t fall asleep at that hut where I had to spend the night, my nerves were tense. Taking care of the regimental banner sewn into my overcoat didn’t give me rest. I took off off this overcoat, hung it in a corner near the icons and did not move away from here. All those articles of the law on which we, officers and soldiers, were brought up, are about keeping and saving the flag, like a regimental shrine, and about terrible responsibility, like moral and legal, for the loss of the banner, stood relentlessly in my mind. Why Andir did not remove this responsibility from me yesterday, after the end of the battle. Why not guard the banner with a guard, as always, and not secretly, by one person. I mentally reproached the regimental commander. After all, now, at night, when complete exhaustion and deep sleep embraced all the regiment, the Germans can break into this hut and what can I do? I was nervous, worried, I wanted to go to the regiment commander again ... but at that time I began to justify the commander, reproach myself for cowardice and cowardice ... and so before dawn , delirious, spent the whole night. "

regiment. Ouspensky.

"I vividly recall one thought that stuck my head in my head and did not leave me all day. Where the standard should be in case of failure if we were cut off the only way to retreat. Under the command that day was about 1.000 human lives, and I thought and suffered about a piece of silk matter nailed to a piece of wood. What does it mean? Now that everything is lost in us, the meaning of this piece of matter is even more pronounced and more understandable. It was an emblem of all that is sacred, uniting everything, without which no legal organization is unthinkable and for that, I would yalsya more than for all human life, I am committed. "

gr. Nirod.

One of the episodes we cited relates to the Guards regiment, l. Guards Kexholm and the other to the army, 29-th Chernigovsky infantry. Both regiments were old, Petrovsky. Both, according to the covenant of their founder, saved, despite the seemingly hopeless situation in which they fell, their flags and their honor.

LABE GUARDS KEXGOLM REGION

This regiment with its resistance of 27-29 of August gave the opportunity to retreat to the broken XV corps. From the German diaries and regimental leaflets it can be seen that during these three days all the regiments of their 1st Army Corps dealt with Kexholms.

Already, the 28 August regiment withstands a tough battle with the 2 German Infantry Division. General Golovin writes: “Soon after noon the German infantry division attacked Rontsken. The fire of numerous artillery accompanies this attack, to oppose [so in the text] to which General. Kondratovich can only be guarded. The Kexholm regiment. The vast superiority in the German forces forces the move away. But he departs step by step, rejecting in the general direction to Lana. " The German official indirectly testifies to what resistance the Kexholms offered to the enemy. story War: "The attack of the 2 Division develops very slowly. This division has lost its previous fighting spirit."

"In the field of rye, south of Rontsken, among the cornflowers (the emblem of the regiment) lies the Kexholm company, which remained faithful to its duty, entirely mown by German machine guns."

29-th position has deteriorated. On the remaining 8 companies under the village of Radomin, two divisions already came over. The next day, only two companies with a banner retreated from the whole regiment. As they advanced, separate small groups joined the remnants of the regiment, which constituted another company. Kexholms, surrounded on all sides, were very worried about the fate of their banner.

Already on the night of 29 on 30 of August, conscious of the almost inevitable death, the regiment commander, Major General Malinovsky, ordered the banner to be cut off and handed it to Second Lieutenant Konstantin Anuchin, as young, tall and thin, so that the banner wrapped around the body would not be visible . The shaft with the double-headed eagle continued to carry the denominator.

By dawn, we saw the village of Wallendorf. Artillery bombardment began from the north and northwest. The commander convened the officers. The shaft was destroyed, and the pommel buried in the ground. The fate of the bracket is unknown to us. Place marked on the map. They chose two best horses, on which Anuchin was planted and non-commissioned officer Vasilyev, who was called up from the reserve, who served in the personnel period l. Guards in Ulansky His Majesty's regiment and gene. Malinovsky ordered them to wade with a banner to Russia, and to the rest of Kexholms, breaking up into small groups, breaking through the encirclement.

Note that the stock of blue silk, which was on the pole, was removed and hidden. Some officers took a small piece of cloth. All in all, 6 officers made their way to Russia and about 400 soldiers, including a full machine-gun crew.

"October 5", writes the gene who accepted the remnants of a regiment in Warsaw. Adamovich, "one of the officers, who made their way out of the encirclement, handed me a tiny piece of blue cloth taken when he removed the flag from the pole. A long time later, the clerk for the economic part, who was constantly at the wagon train, presented me a blue stored in a clerical gig twisted in tube a long strip of silk, obviously - left on the pole when cutting the cloth and torn from the pole before digging and somehow taken out and preserved. "

These were the only parts of the banner that were taken out of the encirclement.

As for the cloth, his fate was different.

After parting with the regiment at dawn on 30 in August, Anuchin and Vasiliev set off. They rode south, but happiness did not smile at them. Soon they came under gunfire and both horses were killed. They dismounted and began to wade among the bushes. Where they toiled before night, where they went and where they slept, they did not know themselves. Shooting was heard from all sides, Germans were seen and heard. With the dawn of August 31, exhausted and hungry, they set off again, but, making their way through the bushes, stumbled upon some kind of patrol.

Vasiliev rose to his full height and with the words: "Your Excellency, save the banner, I will detain them," he began to shoot. The Germans responded. Vasiliev managed to release one clip and fell mortally wounded. Blood gushed from his throat, and Anuchin could only hear his last words: "Run, save the banner." Hero Vasilyev with his death saved the banner, allowing Anuchin to escape from the German outpost. Crouching to the ground, then crawling, then on all fours, the second lieutenant disappeared into a maze of intersecting paths.

All day, until the evening, Anuchin, wrapped in a banner under a marching uniform, was looking for a way out. It seemed that the rescue was near, but he was surrounded by a sudden rift and captured. Fortunately, the Germans did not search him ...

The tragedy of the 2 Army ended. The prisoners were relegated to the rear. Here is what the former regimental adjutant of the Kexholm regiment, Colonel Yankovsky writes about a meeting with Anuchin:

"With a sense of secret anxiety, each of us examined the newly commissioned party of officers, fearing to find Anuchin in it. To our indescribable horror, we saw our standard-bearer in one of them. Eloquent talk of unblinking eyes explained to us that the banner was with him. Picture of salvation the banner of a non-commissioned officer, Starichkov, is before our eyes. Our path is not yet over, our duty has not been fulfilled. The banner must be saved and delivered to Russia. Having surrounded Second Lieutenant Anuchin, we tried, without attracting everyone’s attention, to guard him. de Neisse, we managed to get into one of the rooms of the barracks, where Lieutenant Anuchin was also located. The sad days of our imprisonment stretched. "

"The Germans were looking for something carefully," writes the gene. Adamovich. “It was rumored that they were looking for banners. It seemed that under these conditions it was impossible to save the banner from Anuchin. One night, when everything went out of the way after the guard rounds, all the" sleeping "officers gathered silently, one by one, in the commander's room. In 1926, Colonel V.I. Chashinsky wrote to me: “It has been almost twelve years since that terrible night, but everything that happened is before my eyes. The sacrilege was committed. From the front of the banner was cut out the Face of the Savior, not made by hands. The banner was torn up, pieces were tweaked into small pieces and burned in a furnace. Left one of the corner of the Russian coat of arms and one large flap, as proof of the preservation of parts of our banner. These three parts that had not been destroyed were inserted between the board and the tin of the big icon that turned out to be with Fr Konstantin Vvedensky, and with this icon they were transferred to him for storage. When Father Constantine was transferred to another camp (he died in captivity), he gave this icon to three of our colonels. "

"For fear of disclosing secrets," continues the gene. Adamovich, "the commander ordered that no one should keep a single flag particle. Some still have, except for the banner parts hidden in the icon, a large crown from one of the corner emblems, the coat of arms of the Polish kingdom from the wing of the Russian coat of arms and the outer edge with a sewn star. In subsequent frequent searches, no part of the banner fell into German hands. "

The feelings that troubled the officers with the partial destruction of the banner, very vividly passes Colonel Yankovsky:
"Having made the decision, the regiment commander ordered, after evening laying, when the entire camp fell asleep, all officers began to work, setting the guard room to the door, whose duties were to warn as German sentinels approached all the premises several times a night.

A tragic moment came in our lives, when each of us, with solemn awe, touching the banner of the sacred matter, divided it into parts, in the name of his own salvation. Silently carrying out this terrible work, but necessary for the situation, each of us painted pictures of the first oath, the first kiss and the everlasting solemnity of carrying the banner to the sounds of the historical regiment march.

Listening to the slightest noise and rustle, in the faint light of the cinder, Kexholms hurriedly did their work, turning the parts of the banner to be destroyed into a fluffy wave of blue silk, densely mixed with silver and gold. The large presence of metal in fluffy silk made the banner unburnable. In the weak flame of the furnace, the scattered remnants of the regimental shrine were slowly smoldering, so that the Germans could not detect our sacred rites through the smoke from the chimney. Many officers, wanting to take part in the preservation of the banner, decided to leave small parts of it for a more visual reproduction of the banner afterwards. It was hard to separate yourself from the regimental shrine. "

Looking for banners, the Germans did not hesitate to unfold icons. One such case was a success. In connection with this new danger, the remnants of the cloth were taken out of the icon, the double-headed eagle with a part of the canvas was assumed by Colonel Vladimir Iosifovich Chashinsky, the icon of the Holy Cross - Colonel Georgy Lvovich Boulanger, and the monogram of the Sovereign - Colonel Vladimir Ernestovich Bauer.

Colonel Bogdanovich recalls: “For about two years I was in captivity in Krefeld, where the main mass of Kexholms was, led by the regiment commander. The senior colonel, Colonel Bauer, did not take off his overcoat neither in summer nor in winter, and even slept in it. I He repeatedly asked him, especially in the summer, why he was suffering in a warm overcoat, to which he replied to me and to everyone that he had been tortured with rheumatism and that he was saved only by his overcoat and he did not believe the doctors. Then it turned out that Bauer was wearing a regimental banner worn into his overcoat " .

In September, 1914 was appointed General Adamovich as commander of the regiment being restored. Before leaving for the front, he introduced himself to the Emperor. The sovereign was convinced that the banner of the Kexholm regiment could not be taken over by the Germans. What conversation took place:
"Have you received your banner?"

"No, Your Imperial Majesty, but is the banner saved? We know nothing."

"The Germans do not have your banner. The Minister of War told me that the banner had been delivered ... However, if there is no banner yet, take the old regimental banner with you. But your banner could not die. The banner will return to the regiment."

The fate of the banner in the regiment was not known when letters from captured officers from Germany began to be received. They often wrote about "Zine." "Zina is with us, sending greetings to the old man", "Zina is better", "Zina hopes to return to the old man", etc.

But the first definite news of the rescue of the banner was brought to Russia as if by the widow of General Samsonov, who traveled to Germany to search for the body of the general and visited the prisoner of war camps.

At the end of the war the prisoners were released. All parts of the saved banner were removed from Germany. One of the colonels went to Petersburg. With him he returned to Russia and the image of the Savior, not made by hands. The colonel died long ago. The fate of the piece of cloth stored by him is unknown. Another colonel returned to his apartment in Warsaw; he also died and it is unknown how he disposed of his piece. Only Colonel Chashinsky found himself on the territory occupied by the Volunteer Army, and could present a piece of cloth stored by him on command. After the evacuation of the Crimea, he was kept in the Russian Cadet Corps, whose director was General Adamovich. Here is what he writes:

"In 1921, all the remaining regalia of the Imperial Army were transferred to my care of the office ... I saw, with mental trepidation, among the cut panels of banners, the corner coat of arms from the banner of the native floor with the note" l. Guards Kexholm regiment ". Our banner has returned."
In addition to the eagle, General Adamovich received seven small particles of the cloth in emigration.

Were it not a revolution, the feat of saving the banner would be marked by adding to the regimental lists the names of the valiant Kexholms: General Malinovsky, for giving orders to save the banner, and for keeping him in captivity: Colonels Chashinsky, Boulanger and Bauer, Second-Secondary Anuchin (later shot by the Bolsheviks), father Konstantin Vvedensky and, possibly, senior non-commissioned officer Vasilyev, who died a heroic death in the name of saving the regimental shrine {1} ..

29 th PS. CHERNIGOV GENERAL-FELDMARSHALA GR. DIBICH-ZABALKANSKY REGIMENT

The story of saving this banner seems even more wonderful. Twice it was saved in battle, the first time - 23 of August, under Orlau, and the second time when the regiment was surrounded, 30 of August. It was brought to Russia immediately after the end of the fighting, under quite exceptional circumstances, and in October 1914 was returned to the regiment.

Unfortunately, the story has retained only one name of the father of John Sokolov. The names of many others, sacrificially contributing to the preservation of the banner, remained unknown.

The first episode is described in detail by Colonel Bogdanovich, an officer of the headquarters of the 6 Infantry Division, who conducted an investigation the day after the battle of Orlau. From his book "The Invasion of East Prussia in August 1914," published in 1964, we allowed ourselves to borrow the following excerpts:

"The commander of the 29-th Chernigov regiment, Alekseev, who was behind the center of the combat disposition, saw the retreating units of his regiment, caused the last reserve, the standard half-company, ordered the banner to unfold, and at the head of the half company, having the standard on the left, the regimental adjutant, Lieutenant Golubev, left in a counter-attack against the Germans, who had already appeared on the plateau north of the height of 189. Colonel Alekseev was immediately wounded in the neck, the medical assistant ran up and wanted to bandage the wound, but Alekseev shouted to him: “I found the time to do the dressings, go away! "The next moment, a German bullet in, mouth stopped the life of the gallant regiment commander, who laid his head under the banner of his own regiment ... {2}.

As a magnet attracts iron, so the sight of a proudly roving banner irresistibly attracted both Germans and Chernigov {3} to a regimental shrine. A bitter struggle ensued. The first sought to seize the most honorable combat trophy, which can give the battlefield, the second rushed to defend their military honor and their regiment. The three times wounded flagman finally lets the banner out of his weakened hands, and is picked up by Lieutenant Golubev. The mortally wounded lieutenant Golubev is falling near the body of his commander, and the banner is picked up by the next Chernigov, and the epic struggle continues again; the Germans write: “Maybe there is no other military trophy in the world, for the possession of which would be such a heroic and dramatic struggle on both sides, as was conducted for the banner of the Chernigov regiment. Chernigovets, holding his banner, collapse again, then the wounded denominator cuts off the cloth and hiding it in his chest. This time the pole is already rising, a mortal fight is going on for him again, a pile of corpses and wounded is growing and growing ... "

The Germans can not take possession of the pole. Driven away from him, they now decided to exterminate all the defenders of the pole with a rifle and machine-gun fire. They did not succeed, the pole is no longer visible, as there is no longer any Chernigov standing on his feet in this sad place, everything is either wounded or killed. But still the Germans can not seize the banner, all access to it is now under severe attack from other Chernigov ...

Attempts by the Germans to approach the place of the banner cost them too much. Wounded Chernigov wrestlers at the shaft, not knowing how the battle will end, break the St. George's Cross out of the flag spear with parts of a broken bolt, and try to bury the shaft, break it into pieces, the shaft does not have enough physical strength, and the lack of these forces made it impossible to bury Pole on the field, overgrown with lupus. The attack of Bernikov, the canister of Slukhotsky, the counter-attack of Alekseev and the blow of Tsimpakov again drove the Germans, but for their far prosecution there was no longer any organized forces. Twilight, thick fog came to the clubs from the cleft. Alla, even more intensified the darkness ... "

At nightfall, there was finally an opportunity to get to the place where the hand-to-hand fight for the banner had taken place. Unfortunately, the first to come to this place was the keeper of Ava, the 1 th jäger battalion, he picked up a pole.

"As soon as the verse of the battle," continues the regiment. Bogdanovich, "Chernigov rushed to the place where there was such an inhuman struggle for their banner. The mountains of the dead and wounded surrounded this place. Finally, they dug up before the denominator, the ensign, he was seriously wounded, but he was still alive, could not speak, only gestured to his chest at the questions about the banner. They unbuttoned his blood-filled tunic and underneath found the banner of the banner. At the questions about the pole, none of the wounded could say anything, except that in the dark someone had pulled it out and carried it away. and broken from the spear of the Cross of St. George lay down until the morning. In the morning found in volchane cross, but could not find a staff to deep grief and despair valiant Chernigovtsev ".

September 12, appointed by the regimental commander General Stupin wrote: “The German’s hand didn’t touch the banner. Several Germans rushed to take the banner, but before they reached it, they were jabbed. The situation was such that it was not possible to carry the banner. one of them was screwed onto the body. "

The shaft fell into the hands of the Germans. Under what circumstances exactly was not clarified. The report of the XX German Army Corps said the following: "23 August 1914, in the battle of Orlau, the Jaeger battalion of Count Iorka, after the Russians were driven back, found in their trenches, under a pile of dead, the banner of the Russian regiment of von Dibich. But the regimental history of the 147 regiment clarified that it was not about the banner, but about the pole, without a cloth and without St. George's Cross, but with a brace. The history of the rangers describes the battle: "Then the departure ... the mood is oppressed, no one said or words from the despair of failure and the great losses of the battalion. He lost 17 officers and 254 n. rank. The shaft of the banner of the Russian 29 regiment was found under a heap of dead, late in the evening, by the huntsman Ava ... ".

Subsequently, carried by a picker Ava, who picked it up, the pole was paraded in Berlin and was delivered to Zeihgauz.

Colonel Bogdanovich suggests that Ave came across the battlefield in the dark and accidentally caught a pole. It was quiet and peaceful, and there was no fight for the pole of Ava. "I think that Ava was just confused in separate battle areas that were thrown by us and the Germans. Do not forget that this was the first battle and the battle was very stubborn and, like the first battle, very bloody."

The further fate of the denominator, whose name we did not establish, was the following. Evacuated to Iaydenburg Hospital, he was first taken prisoner, but then, when General Sirelius's detachment entered the city, he was released and was sent to Warsaw describing his feat. Colonel Bogdanovich testifies that by the Highest Order he was promoted to second lieutenant and awarded the Order of St.. George

24 in the morning arrived at the location of the regiment commander of the XV Corps, General Martos. The saved banner was presented to him and immediately nailed to the Cossack pike. In this form, it again became operational regiment assigned to the new denominator.

But this does not end the history of the banner of the Chernigov regiment. 30 August, after several days of heavy fighting, Chernigov turned out to be surrounded. 700 man made their way. Banner could not be removed. It was again removed from the improvised pole and re-hidden on the soldier's chest, under the gym. Znamenshchik captured.

One night after the last battle, the prisoners of Chernigov and Poltava were placed in a large barn, guarded by sentries. Worried about the fate of the banner and fearing the search, the soldier who had kept him found out among the former in the shed of his regimental priest, Father Sokolov. He crawled to him in the twilight of the barn and reported on the rescue of the banner. Considering that it would have been easier for the priest to preserve the banner than for the ordinary soldier, he asked him to take a cloth from him. Batyushka agreed. Immediately, without taking his eyes off the sentries, the soldier handed the banner to the priest, and the latter hid it under his robe.

In the morning Father Sokolov was called to the dying hospital. Taking advantage of this, he asked his sister of mercy to band the banner on it, which was done.

Soon a German officer appeared in the hut and announced that Emperor Wilhelm had ordered to release one priest and ten soldiers to his homeland, who could testify how well the Germans treat prisoners. There were several priests in the hut, but the choice fell on Father Sokolov. The next day, two carts were filed, on which the priest and the soldier, accompanied by a German non-commissioned officer, were moved in the direction of the border. Immediately upon returning, Sokolov’s father went to Headquarters, to Baranavichy, where he personally handed over the banner he had saved to Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolayevich. Alas, the father did not know the name of the soldier who handed the banner to him.

After the restoration and strengthening of the new pole, the banner was returned to the regiment. Father Sokolov was received by the Sovereign and personally awarded him a gold cross on the St. George ribbon. Here's what the newspapers wrote then: “Sovereign Emperor, on 29 the day last September, was personally pleased. You are most welcome when presenting to His Imperial Majesty the priest of the church, 29 infantry. Chernigov General Field Marshal Count Dibich of the Zabalkansky Regiment Ot. gold pectoral cross on the St. George ribbon, from the office of His Imperial Majesty. "

The old pole remained with the Germans. Colonel Bogdanovich writes:
"Winter is 1938 of the year. I am in the Berlin Military Museum, in front of the legendary shaft of the banner of the 29-th Chernigov regiment. Traces of saber blows, hollows, scratches and red blood stains covered the shaft. The hole in the spear at the site of the St. George cross broken from it is menacing blindness. In deep emotion I stood in front of a dumb, but, at the same time, too eloquent witness of how in angry shrapnel, in ominous rattling of machine guns and in the treacherous squeal of rifle bullets, in the clanging of interbred bayonets and in a deaf thud of blows at frets, in a cloud of dust in a whirlwind first heavyweight fight, with short, hoarse cries of "Cheers" was a deadly struggle for possession of the flag. So many people, who beat him for possession rests already 50 years in the eternal dream of the mass graves of an eagle.

In the stark light of the Berlin winter day, an endlessly lonely, deserted and forgotten prisoner seemed like a pole, a stern reproach seemed in his empty spear ... I left with such pain in my heart that I would probably leave after meeting a prison which is in life imprisonment a near and dear creature. "

Comments

[AK-74-1]

Great article. There would have been more such and published in history textbooks.

[mongoose]

eh, thanks to the Bolsheviks and other liberals, the victims of the Russian people in that war were in vain

[Karlsonn]

And you, my friend, are not shy, go straight from the trump cards:

Quote: mongoose

thanks to the Bolsheviks and other liberals

Do not confuse warm with slippery case?

The article is great, thanks.

[btsypulin]

Fully agree with you.

[DUTCH]

Super article, I was filled while reading. Glory to the heroes of the past!

[borisst64]

A very striking episode in the subject of an article in the film "They Fought for the Motherland". In the last shots, the wounded commander kisses the regiment's banner, albeit a feature film, and frost on the skin.

[Karlsonn]

let me subscribe.

[Trapperxnumx]

Of course, the honor is higher than even life itself !!! Glory to the Russian heroes !!!

[topwar.ruk-d]

Great article.

[strannik595]

the Germans did not save their standards along the way

[Landwarrior]

Good article.
It would be nice to recall the Expeditionary Corps
Russians in Marseille